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This Brand May Be Monitored for "Quality Purposes"...and Other Lessons in Consumer-Surveillance

In my ClickZ column this morning, Adapting to Consumer-Controlled Surveillance, I volunteer a dosage of tortured ambivalence about today's marketing environment:

"I often worry that in our sometime irrational exuberance over the benefits and wonders of conversation, brands are blind to what it truly means for consumers -- our coveted buyers and lifetime revenue streams -- to be constantly watching, monitoring, evaluating, and talking about us. At the end of the day, consumers are monitoring brands and companies "for quality purposes" 24/7, far more attentively than companies recording toll-free calls. And that has enormous consequences for how we promote, protect, and manage brands."

It's not that I lack excitement about "participation" and "conversation." I just worry that brands and their agencies -- and other brand stakeholders -- all to often sidestep the more difficult questions around how to truly manage and interact with consumers in this age of "consumer control." Romanticism sometimes suffocates realism. Marketing claims often simply betrays the facts.  This is big theme in my upcoming book, Satisfied Customers Tell Three Friends, Angry Customers Tell 3000: Running a Business in a Today's Consumer-Driven World.  This isn't to suggest I have the answers, but I do know we need to get this particular "conversation" going sooner or later.  In my column I outline six key rules and principles to warm up our thinking. They include:

• We must rethink what it means to be truly credible. In a world of 24/7 consumer surveillance, credibility is everything. Today's infrared-enabled consumer can find every chink in the brand armor. My book outlines the six drivers of brand credibility: trust, transparency, authenticity, affirmation, listening, and responsiveness. Getting these drivers right not only neutralizes the impact of piercing consumer radar but also lays a foundation for a win-win.

• We must become better listeners. Marketers must shift from a paid-media marketing model to a listening-centered marketing model wherein all early signals, whether extreme or ostensibly insignificant, are absorbed and internalized across the brand franchise. This requires both internal brand radar, and processes and tools similar to what my own firm (and many others) provide for external listening.


• We must reposition customer service as the new media department. You can put Dove Evolution, Dove Onslaught, every Doritos consumer-created Super Bowl ad, and dozens of hugely popular user-generated ad spots into a blender, and they still won't come close to filling the Olympic-sized pool of negative media in the conversational airwaves implicating bad customer service. In categories like banking and financial service, conversation indicting customer service owns upwards of 40 to 50 percent of all discussion volume. In electronics, the number is around 20 percent. The consumer-controlled surveillance culture is actively taking notes on customer service, and the narrative -- the content it creates -- can cut in either positive or negative directions depending on how well brands nurture this arena.


• We must rethink the value and importance of indirect marketing, including human resources and operations. In a surveillance culture, consumers see three levels deeper into the brand. What they see has less to do with the message's polish and more with the brand experience's foundational drivers. Products that work require a superb operational backbone. Meaningful service experiences require a service profit chain of well-trained, motivated, loyal employees. Smart, interactive, responsive online interfaces require excellent business processes.


• We must close or integrate the silos. Brands need a united, cooperative front to contend with the elevated power and leverage of the consumer-controlled surveillance culture. At some point, it's just not going to work to have PR firms, advertising firms, digital agencies, and other supplier groups messaging against or with these new currents. We can't have eight different groups managing and interpreting influencers. We probably need to refashion and recast what we mean by holistic communication.

Here's a link to the full article.

Death of a Newspaper: A Final 2007 Post About the Cincinnati Post

Today the 126-year old Cincinnati Post and Kentucky Post published its final issue. This is no small deal, and even the New York Times gave the matter half a dozen column inches this morning.  Admittedly,I wasn't a huge reader of the Post, but it's hard not to feel bittersweet, even a bit nostalgic, about its exit. Indeed, earlier today I couldn't resist cruising around the streets of Cincinnati to capture the paper's last breath of circulation in action. Regrettably, after visiting nearly a dozen stands, I only found one that had copies of the new edition.  Here's a photo gallery from my journey.  While Cincinnati is now a "one-newspaper," I'm probably stop short of using the word "consolidation" to describe what's going on. With the advent of blogging and other forms of CGM, it's just not that simple anymore. Indeed, media continues to fragment everywhere, and the challenge for print publications is to not only harness the digital space an extension of what they do well offline, but also to co-create content with consumers and readers who bring new skills and capability to the table in the event capture and packaging department. Easier said than done, of course, but there's experimentation taking place among newspapers on this front, even here in Cincinnati, with the Cincinnati Enquirer exploiting "expert moms" as part of program called CincyMoms.  Local TV stations are also getting into the act, and there's no question we'll see in 2008 a further blurring of the line around "who owns local content" question.  Never a dull moment!

And so "The Post" wraps up my final post of 2007.  Happy New Year!

CGM Shows Signs of Life on Wikipedia

I just noticed the Wikipedia entry for "Consumer Generated Media" is finally starting to take shape.  That's an encouraging 2007 development, and I hope 2008 sees further definition and elaboration (and supporting links) against this important trend and concept.  I've pretty much sat on the sidelines watching as the definition evolves, and it's quite fascinating.  In the early phase, it was quite obvious that the Wikipedia entry-elite (another 2008 buzzword?) were not too fond of the term "consumer" versus "user" or "people," and at once point someone suggested folding the entry into the User-Generated Content entry.  Fortunately, CGM passed that test.  Early on, someone also noted on the entry that I wasn't the first person to use the term, which appears to be true. Turns out someone did in fact use the term before I did, but in an entirely different context.  Still, there's a beautiful accountability principle at work with Wikipedia that constantly keeps us on our toes.  This form of "group CGM" drives transparency. Lastly, it's pretty obvious that a growing number of folks are linking to the entry as it now owns the #4 position on Google against the query "Consumer Generated Media," up significantly from a year ago. 

MarketingProfs Podcast: Debating the Great "Conversational Divide"

Precipitated in part by a post by my friend and fellow WOMMA board member Jim Nail questioning whether whether social media is scaling the Hype Curve -- a topic I also took on recently in a ClickZ column (Sustaining the Conversation?), I was invited by MarketingProfs Ann Hadley and Paul Dunay to participate in a spirited podcast on the subject.  Jim also participated, although it would be a total stretch to suggest it was a debate, since we agreed on 99% of the points. In a nutshell, I reiterated many of the same points you keep hearing from me on this blog: we're just not credible as marketers on the "conversation" front until we make meaningful investment in listening infrastructures (consumer affairs, relationship marketing).  Too many CMOs and industry pundits are waxing poetic about the power of conversations while the consumer gets snubbed at the brand welcome mat or feedback pipe. We need to get beyond such "conversational divides" and drive more consistency and credibility. Other folks engaged on this topic include Joseph Jaffe and Jen McClure of the Society for New Communications Research.  Here's a link to the podcast

Where's the Dale Carnegie Book on Social Networking?

Why are we so impersonal when we network?  Are networking tools like Facebook or LinkedIn nurturing or watering down intimate relationships.  I suppose it depends on the execution, but when 90% of my "join my network" invites use the same boilerplate one-sentence invite, it makes me wonder.  More on this subject in my recent ClickZ article, Meaningful Relationships With Social Networks.  Is Dale Carnegie still around?  Dude, it's time to write another book!

Must See TV: The Consumer Advertiser Breakup Meeting!

The Break Up
Uploaded by geertdesager

I'm not going to offer much commentary except to say that this video wonderfully captures today's state of affairs between the consumer and marketer.  It's a big reason why CGM is flourishing across the web.  I was  a bit late in discovering this. Thanks, Max, for bringing it to my attention.  More comments here.

Why Do We Recommend?

Why do we recommend?  Recommendations are at the heart of the consumer-generated media (CGM) movement, but why do we bother?  Is there a rhyme or reason, or a rational explanation?  I found myself asking these questions after receiving the upteenth invitation from a friend, close colleague, or 'trusted expert' last week to try this new service called Twitter. I also found myself asking this question after reading a post by marketing blogger Erik Kintz questioning why everyone is making such a huge deal out of Second Life, a question which triggered spirited, mostly validating, responses, by B.L. Ochman  and others.  Second Life is another service that people have sworn by the bible as the most amazing, incredible next big thing -- especially as a platform for marketing -- but I've never quite connected the dots (nor, apparently, has Erik).   

So, again, I ask: why do we recommend?  What's in it for me?  What's in it for the recipients?  And why all of a sudden?  Twitter allows you to instantly send notes or blurbs from your mobile devices about what you are doing to a common shared platform or portal. But is this enough for folks to eat up currency insisting I try it?  Me?   Second Life offers a dynamic virtual worlds environment, but getting set up on the platform is no easy task, and I've started to notice that many of my friends who talk up the site like crazy, or weave Second Life into lofty speeches, barely use it?  What gives?

My general hypothesis is that we recommend products and services to friends for a host of reasons beyond just the obvious -- e.g. we like and value the product.  In fact sometimes we recommend products and services we barely understand.  A couple potential drivers:

• First To Know & First to Tell: There's a certain "social currency" one derives in being first to tell others.  When I first received Gmail, even before putting the product to the full torture test, I found myself telling others about the service, almost as though I needed to validate the fact that I was among the early elite product testers. Google seemed to understand that dynamic quite well, effectively managing the number of accounts I could share with folks.  Joost is doing the same thing, and although my actual experience with Joost is quite limited (who has time), I seem to talk it up with others like it's the next big TV killer.  Is that entirely rational? 

• Favor Banking: There's also the dynamic of the "favor bank."  Social networking often amounts to a big game of tradiing currency. My colleague Max Kalehoff and I trade websites all the time, and there's a beautiful spirit of reciprocity.  Every once and a while Max makes me a bit insecure by sending me sites or blogs I should have already known about,  And so I share stuff with him that may not necessarily be on my personal "playlist" but nonetheless fulfill my quota of information sharing.  At one point, I probably insisted to Max that he check out Second Life.. .with righteousness, I might add.

• Credibility Rub-Off: In the case of Gmail, Google had such crediblity in my eyes that I was willing to make a leap of faith that this would render my spam-heavy Yahoo account irrelevant.  I didn't really need to put the service to the "torture test" to spread the word to others.  It just felt like second nature. In the case of Twitter, respected online conversationalists Robert Scoble and Steve Rubel have lined up in the Twitter camp, and their "cred" factor has probably led to a fair amount of "I gotta use it too!" reactions. Of course, that still doesn't mean the product is a winner.

• Projection: Sometimes we recommend things we wish or aspire to use or consumer, almost as thought the reco is a form of projection.  Hate to admit this, but sometimes I find myself waxing poetic about books in which I've only skimmed the intro and first chapter.  I should be reading this book in its entirely, I seem to be telling myself.  Either that, or I'm trying (consciously or unconsciously) trying to project an undeserved level of booksmarts to others.  Who knows?  That why all of you should take my trusted recommendation and buy a Porsche!  :-)


• Genuine Brand Love:  Of course, there's always just the principle of genuine brand love -- the stuff Jackie Huba and Ben McConnell are always writing about.  Sometimes we're just so fanatical about a particular product experience that we feel the urgent need to tell others; post it on a blog; spread it on a message board, and more.  We're 100% sincere. I do think there's quite a bit of genuine-love around both Twitter and SecondLife, but I suspect the actual target audience is narrower than the cascading recommendations would suggests.  Maybe!

Anyway, I don't want to scare any of you from sending me "cool new stuff."  Just know that I might be secretly wondering exactly what's behind the generosity!  Again, why should I use Twitter?

 

 

Attention Gone Amuck!

My ClickZ article today takes a critical (if not introspective) look at the excesses of advertising.  Importantly, I ask the question.

From shills to cheap thrills, we're just degrading the space and killing our cred factor. We're confirming to the world that we're taking, not creating, value. And as we saw in the flogging mess, our right hand often has no idea what the left one is doing.

More on "Pay to Say" Advertising

My work colleague Max Kalehoff just penned an excellent column for MediaPost that continues the critical conversation on the "Pay to Say" marketing movement.  Good fodder in anticipation of next week's WOMMA conference, where WOM/CGM ethics will be discussed along with a host of other topics. Writes Max:

With consumer-generated media and ensuing consumer empowerment one of the most disruptive trends and opportunities in marketing and media today, it’s time for these pay-to-post services, as well as bloggers, advertisers and others, to step up to the plate and tackle this hazy territory of disclosure. It’s confusing. It’s messy. It’s a liability. And, yes, there will always be scum and fraud on the Internet. In its current state, however, this quasi-legitimate space threatens the greater good and integrity of our online community.

Importantly, among the action items he recommends, he encourages trade groups beyond just WOMMA to step up to the plate to address these difficult (and obvious) questions. I could not agree more.  From IAB and the BBB to the ANA and the AAA, everyone has been unsettlingly quite on these critical (and quite obvious) issues.  These issues are now way bigger that WOMMA. Who will step up to the plate?

A Starting Point for Responsibly Managing Relations With Bloggers

Today the Word-of-Mouth Marketing Association (WOMMA) released draft guidelines to help companies and brands more responsibly manage relations with bloggers.  Hardly perfect, and probably a lightning rod for feedback in key areas that merit deeper conversation, but an important start. Importantly, the very diverse team of WOMMA members that put this together (brands, PR firms, agencies, consultants....many of whom blog themselves and are very passionate about keeping the space trusted and transparent) are encouraging feedback on this set of guidelines.  This is a very challenging subject, but it's long overdue for discussion and debate.  As with the work on disclosure around viral video and the WOM ethics assessment tool kit, WOMMA (full disclosure: I'm a member and board member and a co-chair of the ethics committee along with Dupont's Gary Spangler and Cymfony's Jim Nail) is working hard to proactive address many of these important issues. Says David Binkowski, director of online research of Hass MS&L and co-chair of this project:

"It's an easy way to teach your team and to avoid mistakes that will be harmful to your reputation. Prevention is a powerful protection." 

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